


in the lines of time

by fictorium



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-09
Updated: 2018-11-09
Packaged: 2019-08-21 03:45:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16569017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictorium/pseuds/fictorium
Summary: Prompt: Something about clarifying the 'just friends' definition of their relationship. Maybe Ryan teasing Yas or the doctor being clueless with the boundaries of friendship.





	in the lines of time

**Author's Note:**

> My first Thasmin fic - oh damn, they're delightful!
> 
> Title from Amelia Curran's 'Time, Time'

It’s her mum who starts the whole mess. Always asking one question too many, never thinking that she might be embarrassing Yaz by being so forward.

It’s just lucky - and it is, dead lucky - that the Doctor doesn’t really do _social_ , not the way most people do. Probably thinks that’s a dead standard question anyone would ask. 

So in fact, Yaz has gotten away with it. Like they got away with climbing up cranes, or running from spiders, and even being blasted into the middle of nowhere in space. She gets away with being asked _are you two seeing each other_ even though there’s a part of her that can’t stop gazing, can’t stop laughing at the Doctor’s every joke. 

What Yaz doesn’t expect though, is that ‘are we?’ Like that’s a possibility, a common mistake anyone could make just by looking at them. She’s been so busy gazing at the Doctor all this time, but not once did Yaz check to see if there was any gazing in return. 

***

Ryan’s always had a gob on him, right since that first day in reception. Yaz has always liked him, missed him a little bit even when the inevitable drifting apart happened. So it’s been nice to be back in touch.

Except when he speaks up when nobody bloody asked him.

“Who’s the blonde?” The green-skinned alien with the clipboard asks when they land on the third planet of the day. “Is she your wife?” The question is clearly directed at Yaz.

It wouldn’t be so bad if Ryan didn’t _laugh_ as he corrects the assumption. “Nah man, they’re just friends.”

“As far as you know, anyway. Can’t say cause we’re not married means we’re just friends.” Yaz scoffs, which of course is the point the Doctor decides to check back into the conversation. “I mean, I’m just saying.”

“Never seen anything _just_ about being friends, have you? It’s great having mates. Don’t know why you all talk about it like a consolation prize.”

Ryan pulls Yaz into a one-armed hug, but the look he shoots her says they’re going to have another conversation about this. Great. Maybe her mum put him up to spying. 

“You can all enter,” the alien says to them, clearly bored by the developments. “Wives or not.”

That’s probably why the Doctor links her arm with Yaz’s. For the joke, that’s all. So she can give that big wink as they pass through immigration and onto the next adventure. Yaz smiles right along with her, and tries to tell herself she isn’t completely screwed.

***

“She’s something else, that one,” Graham says, sitting down next to Yasmin on the low wall outside her block of flats. The Doctor is currently chasing an escaped creature that she swears isn’t dangerous, but that should absolutely, definitely not be allowed loose on Earth. 

“Yeah,” Yaz can’t help agreeing, wrapping her arms around her knees and watching the zig-zag running. “She really is.”

“You want to tell her, you know.” Graham puts his hands in his pockets. “I’ve made that mistake before, not saying nothing. You hope if you just rub along for long enough, it’s all going to fall into place. Doesn’t work like that, though.”

“What _are_ you talking about, Graham?” Yaz tries her best copper voice, the one that responds to ‘I’ve only had one beer’ at a traffic stop. “I know we landed hard, but I don’t remember you bumping your head.”

“You and the Doctor. Oh don’t, I know what you’re going to say. You’re just-”

“Just friends,” Yaz finishes, because that’s all she can handle, all she can dare to hope for. Anything else means awkward conversations, misunderstandings, the Doctor suggesting that maybe Yasmin would sit out the next trip, and then the one after that. Not an option, not when there’s so much out there to explore. At the Doctor’s side, of course. 

“That’s a big part of it, you know. Grace was my best friend, and I miss her every time I think of something daft that I can’t tell her. But the way you look at each other... the way she saves us all, but always you first... You can’t say you haven’t noticed it, can you?”

“And it’s just that easy? Just blurt it out over a custard cream at the console? Or should I wait until the next time we’re all ten seconds away from some big explosion?”

“Can’t tell you that.” Graham removes one hand from its pocket and pats Yaz on the shoulder. “That’s for you two to work out. Can’t do that until you start talking about it.”

“Would you say the same if I was Ryan?” She can’t help asking. “Encourage him to make a fool of himself?”

“Difference is, he would be. Making a fool of himself I mean. You though. You’re in with a shot. I know it when I see it, Yaz.”

“Right,” Yaz accepts, closing the conversation off. “I’m going upstairs to put the kettle on. Bring them up when she’s done hunting, will ya?”

***

They’ve landed in the middle of the afternoon, so Yaz has the house to herself. She’s catching up on the news, doesn’t hear the front door open and close. Or that there’s only one set of footsteps, instead of the expected three.

“I could get used to this,” the Doctor says, so close that it makes Yazmin jump half a foot in the air. “Tea at Yaz’s. The boys wanted to go for a kebab, apparently. You don’t mind it’s just me?”

“No... not at all.”

“Good. Where is everyone? Misplaced your family?”

“Work, probably,” Yaz answers. “Better get that tea made.”

Heading back into the kitchen doesn’t help, because the Doctor trails right after her, thumbs hooked in her braces and coat flapping a little as she moves. 

“You know what’s funny?” The Doctor asks, sitting on the worktop as Yaz pops the teabags into two mugs. “The words ‘boyfriend’ and ‘girlfriend’ both have the word ‘friend’ in them. Bit confusing, don’t you think? Like, is someone your friend who’s a girl, or is she your girlfriend?”

Yaz tells herself that she isn’t trembling as the kettle clicks off and she lifts it to pour. “Depends, I guess.”

“Yeah,” the Doctor agrees. “Don’t you think, though, that someone could be both? One doesn’t cancel out the other, not really. So how does anyone know if they’re one or the other?”

“Well, you do things with a girlfriend that you probably don’t do with your friends,” Yaz explains. She can handle this. Squeeze the teabags, add the milk. The Doctor said last time she liked a bit of mustard in her tea, but that can’t possibly be right. Still, Yaz retains each fact and preference like it’s treasure for her to hoard. “That’s the difference.”

“What sort of things?”

“You know, stuff.” Yaz really doesn’t want to start listing activities, because then she’s going to start thinking about doing them, and have the Doctor’s lips always looked so shiny under electric light like this? “Kissing, that kind of thing. Girlfriends do that.”

“Do they?” Why does the Doctor have to make everything sound like the most interesting fact she’s ever heard? On anyone else it would be an affectation, trying to pretend like it’s all so fascinating. Except this is the Doctor, and Yaz has never once seen that genuine interest slip. “Is that why we haven’t kissed? Because you told your mum we’re just friends?”

“I-”

“Because it’s important, not lying to your mum. I get that.”

Yaz watches the milk settle in the tea, watches the clear brown liquid turn creamy, lightening with every stir of the spoon. Tea makes sense. She’s been making tea since she was old enough to safely reach the kettle. Just focus on the cups, and everything else will start making sense in a minute. It has to. 

“I wasn’t… I’m not... “ 

“Only I was thinking,” the Doctor continues, shifting her weight from one arm to the other like she jump down and run any minute. “It’s not lying if you just change your mind, is it? No harm in that. Do it all the time. Sometimes change it and change it back in the same millisecond, me.”

“Doctor…” Yaz feels like she’s holding a soap bubble in her hand. The wrong move, a breath to close, and it’s all going to evaporate and she’ll never get it back. “Are you saying…?”

“Yes?” She has a habit of that. Saying yes before she knows what the question is. God, Yaz is gone on her. It would be embarrassing for anyone less amazing. 

“Are you saying you want to kiss me?”

“Well, I’d like a cup of tea, too. So as long as I don’t have to choose, yeah. S’pose I am.”

“And you realise,” Yaz says, leaving the mugs where they sit and stepping closer to the corner of the kitchen units where the Doctor has taken up residence. Another step and she’ll be standing between those parted legs. “That this is the first time you’re mentioning anything of the sort. And that I’m not psychic?”

“My paper is!” The Doctor whips the little leather wallet from her pocket with a cheeky grin. “Just like your little warrant doodah, isn’t it?”

Yaz has her warrant card in her pocket, of course, carries it everywhere with her. South Yorkshire Police might not have the best reputation in the country, but she’s determined to change that. It’s people like her who’ll right the wrongs, make up for past failings. Meeting the Doctor has only made Yaz even more sure of that. 

And now she has to be sure of this, or she’ll never get the kiss (and more, damn, so much more) that has been keeping her tossing and turning all those nights on the Tardis. Yaz takes one more step, places her hands gently on each of the Doctor’s thighs, and leans the rest of the way in.

“So you really want to know the difference between a girlfriend and a girl who’s your friend?” 

The Doctor is captivated, those dark eyes that show so much and hide even more are fixed on Yaz’s face. A tilt of her head, like she’s seeing Yaz for the first time; like they haven’t been in each other’s pockets for weeks now. 

Yaz closes the rest of the small distance between them, pressing her lips against the Doctor’s and delighting in the happy sigh that greets her when she does. Any expectation that Yaz will play tutor here, that she’s going to take charge and show how it’s all done, passes in the seconds it takes for the Doctor’s strong fingers to tangle in Yaz’s hair. She runs her fingers through like she’s just been waiting for an excuse, pulling Yaz closer and deepening the kiss into something that couldn’t be mistaken for platonic on any planet. 

And then, of course, the front door. Yaz hears it this time, hard not to with her whole family trooping through it. There’s just enough time to pull away from the frankly perfect snogfest that they’d started, but Yaz knows from her mum’s first glance that they’re entirely busted. How could they not be? Both of them are breathing hard, lips shining, and Yaz knows her eyes are probably as wild as the Doctor’s right now. 

“Najia!” The Doctor really has to stop picking favourites, but it interrupts the shared, stunned silence at least. “Nice to see you again. We were just having tea.”

“Is that what you’re calling it these days?” Yaz’s mum teases them, but she’s already in motion to refill the kettle, adding fresh mugs to fill. She brushes past them, Yaz still stood between the Doctor’s legs like she doesn’t know anywhere else to be. “Staying for dinner, Doctor?”

“Ooh, can I?”

“Actually,” Yaz decides. “I think we’re going out for dinner. Just the two of us.”

“Right,” the Doctor adjusts effortlessly, hopping down from the kitchen counter and taking Yaz’s hand in her own. “And that,” she adds triumphantly. “Is a date!”

Yaz ducks her head and groans quietly. It’s not like she ever expected they’d keep it to themselves, but that was fast even by their standards.

“Yeah, yeah, happen it is. Don’t wait up, you lot.”

She pulls the Doctor by the hand down the short hallway and out onto the stone-floored landing. 

“Yaz?”

“Yes?”

“We didn’t have our tea.”

Yaz cracks up laughing at the genuine loss in the Doctor’s voice. “We’ll get some more, promise. Now, where do you fancy for dinner?”

They reach the stairwell before the Doctor tugs back on their joined hands, pulling Yaz in for another universe-bending kiss. She really is good at that. Minutes and minutes pass, and by the time they part Yaz forgets she asked the question at all. She gets her answer all the same.

“Anywhere, Yaz. I’d go anywhere with you.”

And that, she has to concede, is a pretty good start. 


End file.
